[media-credit id=351 align=”aligncenter” width=”495″][/media-credit] The different beers blended into New Belgium sours.

The towering oak barrels fill the room like a stand of redwoods.

Some arrived by semi truck from California wine country. Others were shipped from France, piles of staves and rings to be reassembled later. The largest can hold 3,445 gallons.

These are the giants of barrel-aged beer – the foudres of New Belgium.

The Fort Collins brewery threw quite the party Friday night, inviting 750 fans to walk among the foudres, listen to the brewery’s barrel-aged masters explain their craft and sample and celebrate this year’s release of two sour beers – La Folie and the collaboration Transatlantique Kriek.

The sold-out event, Lost in the Woods, provided a window into the painstaking work that goes into creating a beer style whose growing popularity is testament to the maturing tastes of craft beer drinkers.

The foudre project (it’s a French term for large wooden vat) shows the range of New Belgium, the nation’s third largest craft brewer. Just down the hall from a 200-barrel brewing system that produces Fat Tire bound for 30-plus states is a program that could produce as little as one keg.

Last year, New Belgium added enough woodwork to eventually double its sour beer production to 3,600 hectoliters (a hectoliter is about 26.5 gallons). “Eventually,” because sours require patience. At the outset, New Belgium will focus on supplying all its markets with sours rather than turning out new beers.

New Belgium brewmaster Peter Bouckaert brought sour beers to New Belgium in the late 1990s with the introduction of La Folie, which rests in oak between one and three years before being bottled. Bouckaert arrived in Fort Collins from Rodenbach brewery in his native Belgium, home to a famed sour red.

“In the beginning, you should have tasted the beer we made,” Bouckaert said. “It was hilarious. There’s going to be good beer and bad beer. Time is what you need.”

Bouckaert said New Belgium would like to again double the size of the sour project, and he’d like not just to brew greater volumes of La Folie and Eric’s Ale but also more collaborations with other brewers.

New Belgium has one of the biggest barrel projects in U.S. brewing.

Lauren Salazar, New Belgium’s wood cellar blender and manager, also mentions The Bruery in Orange County, California, and Chicago-based Goose Island, which she said has been given an influx of cash from Belgian corporate parent Anheuser-Busch InBev to expand production of its popular Bourbon County Stout.

Salazar predicts a flood of new sours entering the market this year.

[media-credit id=351 align=”aligncenter” width=”495″][/media-credit] The foudre room was thrown open for the Lost in the Woods bash.

In Colorado alone, breweries including Great Divide, Dry Dock Brewing and Denver Beer Co. all are investing in sours, and newcomers Crooked Stave and Three Barrel Brewing specialize in the style. (Crooked Stave’s increasingly crowded barrel cellar now has eight foudres of its own).

Salazar described a fascinating struggle in how New Belgium approaches sours. One the one hand, she believes in sticking with the flagship, La Folie. The brewery takes pride in the big brown sour’s consistency from year to year – not an easy trick in a brewing style prone to unpredictability.

Yet craft consumers always are looking for something new. Breweries that don’t introduce new beers on a regular basis risk losing customers to those that do. New Belgium has certainly responded to that market dynamic, replacing some of its seasonal beers every couple of years with new offerings.

“I want to dig in my heels,” Salazar said. “I want La Folie to be that comfort, so people can walk in and know that it is going to be there for them. But the reality is this rotation nation we’re up against.”

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In Colorado, our pint glasses overflow with excellent beer. New breweries, new batches, festivals every other week. How lucky are we? First Drafts is The Denver Post's beer blog aimed at helping you keep tabs on the state's ever-expanding craft beer culture. We offer a mash of news, event coverage, homegrown stories, tasting notes and tips to help you imbibe. Expert drinker or homebrewer? Let us know what you're loving about Colorado's beer scene. Not sure exactly what a firkin is? No worries, let us be your guide. Go ahead. Belly up and drink it in!